Moshe Rabbeinu and Rabbi Akiva first met – as our Sages anachronistically describe – when the Torah was about to be given. Moshe was atop Mount Sinai waiting to receive the Torah. After hearing from G-d about this great Sage, Akiva ben Yosef, he was granted his wish to meet him[1] and Moshe was then transported to the Beit Midrash of Rabbi Akiva (Menachot 29b).
Of all our great leaders it was specifically Rabbi Akiva who G-d “introduced” Moshe to. Why not Ezra who restored Jewish life after the destruction of the Temple, someone who was so great “it would have been appropriate had the Torah been given to Ezra but Moshe came first” (Sanhedrin 21b)? Why not Hillel on whose rulings so much of Jewish life is based, or Rav Yochanan ben Zackai, who literally saved Judaism by giving up Jerusalem so that the Sages could study in peace in Yavne? What about Rebbe Yehuda Hanassi, the editor of the Mishna, or even the Rambam – as Jewish folklore notes “from Moshe [Rabbeinu] to Moshe [Maimonides] there arose none like Moshe”?
G-d wanted Moshe to meet Rabbi Akiva because Rabbi Akiva was the second lawgiver of the Jewish people, no less important than Moshe Rabbeinu.
“Rabbi Akiva says: If one studied Torah in his youth he should study Torah in his old age; if he had students in his youth he should have students in his old age…Rabbi Akiva had twelve thousand pairs of students from Gevat to Antipatris in Judea, and they all died in one period because they did not treat each other with respect. And the world was desolate until Rabbi Akiva came to our Rabbis in the South and taught his Torah to them. Rabbi Meir, Rabbi Yehuda, Rabbi Yosei, Rabbi Shimon, and Rabbi Elazar ben Shamua. And these are the very ones who established Torah at that time [and for all time]” (Yevamot 62b).
We would be missing parts of Torah had Hillel not become the leader of the people; it would have taken longer to develop Torah scholars had Rav Yochanan ben Zakai not lived. But Torah would have been diminished, not lost Had Rabbi Akiva not had the strength to continue after losing 12,000 pairs of students – and it hard to imagine how he has such strength [3] – Torah would have been lost and the world would have been desolate.
Yet it this were the only reason, Moshe could have just as easily been introduced to Yehoshua ben Gamla. “Rav Yehuda says in the name of Rav: Truly, that man must be remembered for the good, and his name is Yehoshua ben Gamla. If not for him the Torah would have been forgotten from the Jewish people” [3] (Bava Batra 21a). As the Talmud goes on to explain, it was Yehoshua ben Gamla who set up the public school system for Jewish children, transferring the educational and financial burden of educating one’s children from individual parents to the community at large.
Of course, such a “meeting” may have been nice but would have been missing an actual Torah discussion. Yehoshua ben Gamla was not a rabbi and there is no indication that he was very learned. His position as kohen gadol came about because he married into a wealthy family (Yevamot 61a). G-d wanted Moshe to see how the Torah would be faithfully followed some 1,500 years later in very different circumstances than when it was first given. Hence it was Rabbi Akiva whom he would meet.
True as that may be there seems to be another reason why Moshe had to meet Rabbi Akiva. It was Rabbi Akiva who taught the importance of the mitzva veahavta l’reacha kamocha, to love your fellow man as yourself (Vayikra 19:18), calling it the fundamental principle of the Torah. Having witnessed his own students not properly respecting one another he understood that no level of Torah learning can atone for being remiss in how we treat our fellow man. The more Torah one learns the more one must honour others. Love of G-d must inspire love of man.
No human being had as close a relationship to G-d as Moshe Rabbeinu. “Never again did there arise in Israel a prophet like Moses—whom the Lord singled out, face to face” (Devarim 34:10). And no one taught the importance of loving others more than Rabbi Akiva.
Yet there was no greater defender of the Jewish people than Moshe Rabbeinu who time and time again argued with G-d, going so far as to grab His garment (Brachot 32a) on behalf of the Jewish people.
And there was none who demonstrated a greater love of G-d than Rabbi Akiva. “They were raking his flesh with iron combs, and he was reciting shema, accepting upon himself the yoke of Heaven. His students said to him: Our teacher, even now, He said to them: All my days I have been troubled by the verse: 'With all your soul'– even if G- d takes your soul. I said: When will the opportunity be afforded me to fulfill this verse? Now that it has been afforded me, shall I not fulfill it? He prolonged echad, One, until his soul left his body with echad” (Brachot 61b).
Moshe Rabbeinu and Rabbi Akiva teach that love of G-d must lead to love of man and love of man must lead to love of G-d. How fortunate were they to meet.
[1] A close read of this fascinating Talmudic story indicates that they did not actually meet. Moshe sat quietly in the back of the Beit Midrash and “left” upon hearing a discussion revolve around “a law given to Moshe on Mount Sinai”.
[2] We in our generation have tragically seen people with same strength as Rabbi Akiva; those who lost everything in the Holocaust but nonetheless built beautiful and successful second lives.
[3] It is an article of faith that the Torah will never be lost. Nonetheless “one may not rely on miracles” and from a human perspective, the one our Sages demanded we live by, without Yehoshua Torah would have been lost.
